


Jealousy

by BlownAwayEveryday



Category: Bohemian Rhapsody (Movie 2018), Queen (Band)
Genre: Arty Freddie, Christmas Fluff, Domestic Fluff, Fluff, Fun Roger, Insecure Jim, Jealous Jim, Jim reflecting on married life, Jim's POV, Kitten Antics, M/M, More Fluff, Playful Freddie, Snow, loved up boys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-01
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:40:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,983
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28465458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlownAwayEveryday/pseuds/BlownAwayEveryday
Summary: Freddie heads out to the club leaving Jim home alone with his insecurities, not realising that he still blames himself for Freddie being kidnapped in New York, and thinks he deserves the ultimate revenge.Freddie is oblivious, but perhaps he and Ebony are just the remedy that Jim needs.A tale in the Encounters theme following the boys into the Christmas season of 1972, as they navigate married life and build a cosy home together.
Relationships: Jim Hutton/Freddie Mercury
Comments: 13
Kudos: 16





	Jealousy

**Author's Note:**

> Happy New Year lovies!  
> I wish you all the very best for 2021. 2020 was pants – and that’s an understatement. I do hope you are all seeing in the new year cosy and safe.  
> Here is the new Encounters tale – at long last – I do hope you enjoy it. A more reflective chapter than some of my others so I hope it comes across as intended - do let me know what you think.  
> Oh – and because it’s been so long since you last had an update – here are the Encounters tales in chronological order in case you want to recap. Don’t worry if you are new to Encounters, hopefully this tale of love and fluff will stand alone:
> 
> Encounters  
> Encounters: Shooting Star  
> Those are MY socks!  
> Ruffled Fur  
> Jealousy

The clink of the brandy balloon set lightly on the coaster punctuated time.

It was a reason to pause, an excuse, a natural segue for Jim to stop reading the same passage of his book, the passage he had read fifteen times over but still hadn’t absorbed.

Up until now Jim had only glanced at the clock two or three times per minute, now he had cause to slip the marker between the pages, close the book, and take on board fully that it was 3am, and Freddie was still not home.

He wasn’t really sure what else he had expected when he had finally encouraged Freddie to hit the clubs without him.

That had been an arduous task.

Jim just wasn’t the clubman that Freddie was, and he worried that Freddie was staying home just to please him.

The people who were quick to condemn Freddie’s new contentedness as a home body were the same people who only knew one side of Freddie - the showman.

The entertainer.

The man who showered intrigue and glamour into the lives of everyone he met.

The man who would guarantee those associated with him would eat at the best restaurants and get front row seats at the year’s biggest events - despite only being at the start of his career.

Freddie had a natural magnetism. An exuberance that made people follow him without question. It opened doors for him and to those associated with him no matter how fleetingly, and Jim’s friends couldn’t believe their luck.

Those same people – no matter how well intentioned – were not allowed to see the other side of Freddie.

Little Freddie.

The boy who would stay home in front of the TV wrapped in his blanket, not enjoying the movie but too timid to go to someone else’s party.

The boy who would stutter and stammer in the gentlest lilt when confronted with a camera and a microphone, the tools of the trade that could propel his career skyward or ruin it completely.

The boy who would falter, hesitating a moment or two behind when introduced to new people.

It had taken the combined efforts of both Jim and Roger to coax Freddie back out of his marital nest and onto the London scene. Both worried by Freddie’s growing dependence, and too much time spent at home.

It was counterintuitive to Jim, who adored being the subject of Freddie’s adulation and devotion, but he also knew those characteristics were unhealthy in the long term.

Jim couldn’t fail to feel heroic when wrapped in his lover’s slender arms.

When he gazed down to see Freddie’s adoring lash lined chocolate brown eyes gazing up at him.

How those rosebud lips were always ready to be kissed.

How he would melt in Jim’s arms no matter how many times they had made love that day.

Once out, Freddie has burst back onto the scene, flirting, and fluttering between established artists, studio executives and sound engineers.

How readily he absorbed praise and compliments, never appearing to be fulfilled.

How Freddie adored being adored.

The same people were there again to bear witness.

Quick as a flash they would revert to Jim with an outpouring of gossip about Freddie’s antics of the night before– risqué enough to make the storytellers revel in having something juicy to report, not nearly damning enough to be called adultery.

Jim knew what people thought of him waiting at home alone yet again. They would wear that expression, and their heads would tilt.

Pity

Fool

Doormat

This was another story with two sides.

Freddie was young. Barely out of boyhood when Jim had married him. Jim remembered what it was to need the bright lights, the beat, the fashion, and the culture, and no one had been more important to him than his friends at Freddie’s age.

Jim had left even his family behind in the pursuit of lifestyle.

He hadn’t married Freddie to stop him from having a good time.

He loved every cell of him just as he was.

Just being married to Jim was commitment enough from Freddie at his stage of life.

It was the other side of the story that was more disquieting.

The loving husband sitting at home watching the slow hand of the clock. Each second that passed another bullet point registering in Jim’s mind, another bar, another act, another man.

Jim would never give voice nor satisfaction to what was on everybody else’s mind.

Jim had seen the dark side.

He could barely bring himself to accept his own fault…. jealousy.

He had heard his own voice raised in anger.

He had watched his lover’s face twist in anguish, grimace in pain, and freeze in fear.

He had walked out and left him there.

Left him alone and vulnerable. Ripe for a madman to swoop down and pick him clean from the centre of his loving self-made family.

Jim’s jealousy could have been the death of the man he adored more than life itself.

Jim had pictured himself sitting alone on the flight home from New York. The seat beside him empty, and for that reason he tolerated the sofa seat beside him to remain empty for too many nights to contemplate.

In short – he deserved to be alone.

Jim’s mum adored Freddie, but she too was beginning to see the dark side, the anguish and the pain that fused the boys she loved together.

Jim has confessed to her that Freddie had come to him wild, exciting, and magnetic, but also wounded, bruised, and tormented.

She had recognised that Jim’s short time with Freddie had already scarred her son. Changing him from the easy-going cigarettes and pint man into a tangle of guilt and fear.

She knew not why.

********************************

Ebony - Freddie’s black furred emerald eyed kitten jumped down from the reclining chair, breaking Jim’s reverie and making him jump a little.

She stretched, one paw at a time, before puffing out her tail and weaving herself affectionately around Jim’s legs.

Jim reached down and smoothed the velvety fur behind her infant ear.

“Little daddy’s late again isn’t he darling,” Jim said to the kitten. “Don’t worry, he won’t have forgotten you my love; you’ll be first in line for kisses when he walks through that door” Jim assured her, reaching down to scoop up the kitten in one large palm.

Jim rose from the chair, planting a kiss on the kitten’s little black nose. “Let’s see, I bet little daddy left something tasty for you in the kitchen before he went out.”

Jim shivered, casting a sideways glance at the roaring fire, and hoped he wasn’t coming down with something. He kept the house unbearably warm as Freddie always felt cold, usually too hot for himself to tolerate, but today he felt no heat at all.

Jim walked over to the window, pulling the curtain back. He glanced up and down the snow-covered street hoping for a glimpse of blue-black hair shimmering in the moonlight, or the sound of raucous voices raised in song.

There was nothing.

The street was unnaturally quiet for Kensington in the run up to Christmas, and the snow had drifted, the yellow streetlight casting beautiful shapes in the crystalline ice.

Jim shuddered this time at the sight of such cold, and quickly dropped the curtain.

“Come on then” he repeated to Ebony, snuggling her warm body close.

Jim entered the kitchen and flicked on the light switch. The bulb flickered and clicked before plunging the usually welcoming kitchen back into darkness.

“For fuck’s sake!” Jim hissed, setting Ebony gently down onto the large farmhouse table before fumbling inside the cupboard for the candles and matches.

Freddie had recently bought some large brass candle sticks from Kensington Market.

Roger had ribbed him for hours about being a Victorian maid in a past life, and what he could possibly do with them, but tonight they would be very useful in this life.

Once strategically placed, the candles washed the kitchen with light and warmth.

Ebony had silently relocated, and it took a couple of moments for Jim to make out the silhouette of her ears as she perched beside Mary’s sewing machine, which was set up on the dining table.

Jim sniggered at a memory from earlier in the day of Freddie trying “to drive the damn thing” as he had screamed in temper while wrestling some unfortunate fabric from the machine’s jaws and launching it across the kitchen.

His face has been screwed up red, his delicate pianist hands screwed into furious fists on the tabletop.

It was at these moments that Jim had learnt to assume his most soothing tones, when in reality he wanted to howl with laughter.

Freddie didn’t like the learning process; he couldn’t bear to be second place.

In truth he was very skilled with needlework, but had always worked by hand, and charmed his friend Wendy into running up the more complicated pieces on her sewing machine.

Jim glanced into the corner, sure enough the cotton entangled lump of satin fabric was still where it had landed, draped over the tea caddy.

He couldn’t be sure if the ivory satin had been one of Mary’s blouses in a past life, and if she would kill Freddie for that later.

Jim sniggered again. It was difficult to tell who wore the pants in that relationship. It was one of natures true symbiosis, with both friends needing the other equally.

Ebony sat on the table contented to lick her fur for a moment when something beneath her grasped Jim’s attention.

The sewing machine – and Ebony – rested on Freddie’s large sketch pad. Beneath was the beginnings of a beautiful sketch of Ebony.

The cat in the drawing was very large – much larger than Ebony in real life - and not yet complete, but the outline was unmistakably her. The pose, the tail wrapped around her upright elegant frame, one paw raised ready to be licked clean.

The sketch was exceptional, and Jim felt his heart catch for a moment when he considered his husband’s considerable skill, and depth of feeling for the kitten.

Jim picked up the brandy bottle. It was nearly full, but he didn’t want to drink anymore right now.

He considered making a cup of tea. He didn’t really want one of those either, but he placed the kettle on the hob anyway. The light from the gas ring curiously reflected off something sparkling on the countertop.

The fabric felt soft and fuzzy in Jim’s large fingers, but it was the light glancing off the tiny rhinestones that really caught his attention.

The stones were arranged in a small curvy heart with the two sides rather than arriving a peak, continued into a small cross. Jim has seen Freddie’s hand swirl this unique heart above the ‘i’ when signing his name for a fan.

The artistry didn’t stop there.

Inside the heart were the letters that made up the word ‘Ebony’ spelt out with the sparkling stones.

The workmanship was that of a fine jeweler. 

Jim brought the work closer to his eyeline, and below the heart was a tiny bell which made such a delicate tinkle that it was barely audible to Jim, but Ebony came running.

Jim stroked a hand down the silky fur of her back. “I think this might be for you darling” he whispered as the kettle began to whistle. “It looks like you’re getting a pretty new collar for Christmas.”

He raised the fabric back to his eyeline.

“I can’t tell what colour it is in this light, but it looks darker than your old one. Maybe a dark pink, or perhaps red. You certainly are loved kid” he assured the kitten.

Jim placed the ring of fabric delicately back where he had found it, when he spotted Ebony’s first collar.

He picked up the tiny collar, realising for the first time how much the kitten had grown in his husband’s care, and marvelled momentarily at the level of detail that Freddie observed.

Not only had he noticed that the kitten had outgrown her collar, but he had gone to the length of handcrafting an exquisite new collar for her. Not because it was cheaper to make one himself – but because this collar was far better than anything money could buy.

Jim shook his head with a chuckle. He hadn’t even noticed that Ebony was without a collar.

He dropped a tea bag into his mug, pouring the steaming water on top quickly as Ebony mewed for his attention.

A small pouch of kitten food sat on top of a handwritten note.

‘Ebony’s Friday treat. Love you both. Freddie xx’

There it was - the unique heart above the ‘i’.

Jim chuckled; the note would have been even more sweet had it not followed the Thursday night treat or proceeded the Saturday night treat. Not to mention the scraps of food that Freddie passed beneath the table to Ebony at mealtimes – the actions he thought went unnoticed.

The kitten was spoilt rotten and would be overweight before her first birthday.

“Come on then” Jim repeated as he placed Ebony on the harlequin kitchen floor, and picking up her bowl and his mug, set off back into the living room.

“As little daddy is out you can eat in front of the fire just this once… but don’t tell him that I let you, alright!”

**********************

Jim tossed another log onto the fire, and the sparks shot up the chimney as though released from a sparkler on bonfire night.

03:40 a.m. Still no sign of Freddie.

Jim straightened, unrolling the polar neck of his jumper fully and tucking it up around his ears.

It was freezing!

It was so dark in the room. The bulb seemed to be dimming by the second. He was certain he had paid the electricity bill. He remembered joking with the postmaster that his utility bills had trebled since he married.

Jim glanced at the Christmas tree, and momentarily considered putting the lights on.

He smiled to himself when he recalled Freddie’s insistence upon an 10ft real fir tree.

“It’ll look ridiculous!” Jim had argued, but somehow it hadn’t, it was just perfect.

Decorated in warm traditional colours with a handful of baubles – each one different – and the electric lights that looked like real taper candles which Freddie had begged for to the point that Jim was worried he might cry.

As stern as Jim appeared sometimes, Freddie always got his own way.

As did Ebony who was skulking over to the Christmas tree.

“Don’t!” Jim ordered, one finger raised as the kitten stopped in her tracks, paw poised waiting for her daddy to lose concentration before she continued her journey up the tree.

Jim settled back into his chair, lost in thought for a moment as he admired the tree.

He still hadn’t been introduced to Freddie’s father. It troubled him greatly.

Kashmira had swallowed it whole in just one bite, as only a teen could.

Love at first sight, homosexuality, marriage.

Thrilled to be in possession of gossip that would chill her reserved parents to the core. Knowing that they would fear for their only son’s immortal soul should they ever find out what she knew, but still she had never wielded the truth as a weapon, and Jim respected her for that - she could have done. Instead she was excited to have gained an even bigger brother – one who owned a car.

They saw a lot of Kashmira.

She visited on her way home from school, usually brandishing her art homework.

Her and Freddie were both good natured like that, and they helped each other freely, without too much cajoling. Freddie would do her homework, and Kashmira would model Freddie’s costumes while he made last minute adjustments.

Ebony had gained a young playmate, and Kash thought it none too obvious that she hung around longer during Roger’s visits.

03:50 am

*****************

Ebony strode like a tiny black panther towards the door, pacing sleekly back and forth, brushing the door with her tail as though scattering magic dust that might conjure up her daddy.

She stopped in her tracks, ears pricked up when there was a commotion outside, followed by Roger’s high-pitched wail.

“Where’s your key? Idiot. Moron. Fuckwit” he teased.

Freddie squealed at what must have been a jab to the ribs.

“Jim’s got my key” he slurred, “where’s my Jim?”

“Jim didn’t even come out tonight!” Roger shrieked at one hundred decibels “…but if he had he would call you an eeeeeeeeeejit. Phoebe, search his pockets!”

“Must you call me that in public?” Peter grumbled good naturedly.

Freddie squealed with laughter. “It’s your name darling. What else would we call you?”

“Roger help me, I can’t hold him up and search him” complained Peter.

“Oooooh baby” Freddie purred “Do that again.”

“Behave!” muttered Peter “I’m feeling for your pockets, not your tight little tushie.”

“I don’t have pockets darling” stated Freddie regally. “Royalty don’t carry keys.”

Jim chuckled before swinging the door as wide as it would go.

Freddie and Roger stumbled over the threshold and went sprawling in a heap of limbs, bomber jackets and scarves.

A giggling, squirming mess.

Ebony meowed indignantly, puffing up to twice her usual size before skittling across the room to the relative safety under the sofa.

Peter stepped over the threshold with dignity, whipping off his glove to clasp Jim’s hand in a warm handshake. “Jim, good to see you again mate.”

“Come in, come in” Jim said gladly ushering Peter into the warmth, as he looked back outside first left then right for Brian and Deaky.

“They’ve gone home” Peter responded to Jim’s unasked question.

Freddie had rolled onto his tummy whispering Ebony’s name as though equally surprised and delighted to find a kitten under his sofa.

Gently he reached for the tiny, clawed paw which poked out from underneath, tickling the soft downy fur of her tummy. The kitten resolutely remained in her place of safely, but she did treat her daddy to a loving mew.

Jim grabbed Freddie’s legs and dragged him out from under the sofa. Pulling him unceremoniously into a vaguely upfront position so he could be kissed. His lips were soft, warm, and eager, and Jim felt as though he had been starving.

He clutched Freddie’s buttocks and hoisted him from the ground, Freddie pressing his legs tightly around Jim’s waist as the kiss deepened, full of longing and promise.

Jim shrieked as the icy tip of Freddie’s nose caught his cheek, dropping Freddie onto his feet.

“My God, you’re freezing!” he exclaimed.

Jim gathered the collar of Freddie’s jacket and scarf as he pulled him close for another kiss. “I’m pleased to see that you’re still wearing these.”

“It’s freezing!” Freddie confirmed, coughing into his hand. “Why wouldn’t I be wearing these?!” he asked mystified, as though it didn’t always fall to Jim to keep him dressed for the season.

“Did you have a good time?” Jim asked affectionately.

“Yes” Freddie said urgently kissing the tip of Jim’s nose.

“Roggie, you have got to listen to this!” Freddie shrieked, releasing Jim, and grasping his friend’s wrist to drag him over to the turn table.

He stopped for a moment as though stunned, then flicked on the Christmas tree lights.

“Darling, why are you sitting in the dark?” he exclaimed with great concern.

Jim chuckled before reaching to take Peter’s coat.

“Come on Peter, I’ve got some brandy if you fancy one?”

“Thanks, I wouldn’t mind a nightcap” Peter said, folding into the armchair.

Jim hovered in the doorway for a moment, just to assure himself that Freddie really was home.

He allowed his eyes to roam over Freddie’s silhouette, from the beige Chelsea boots, up to his slim white denim clad thighs.

Freddie held up an album sleeve, but his attention wasn’t on it, his hungry dark eyes locked with Jim’s over the card, the dark-haired angel dressed all in white was smouldering beside the Christmas tree.

*********************

Freddie’s weight felt good in his lap.

Jim nuzzled at his neck, pushing sleek curls away with his nose as his lips pressed teasingly against soft skin. It reminded him of another night spent many seasons ago when a stolen kiss to the nape of Freddie’s neck was greeted with a warning glare from Brian.

Roger laughed as Ebony raced around in circles as though she was a puppy chasing her tail. He raised the fluffy toy making her jump higher and higher on her tiny paws, pirouetting gracefully before landing delicately to start the game again.

“Hey Freds, Ebony looks like you when you are performing Liar” he quipped, before bursting into laughter at his own joke.

Jim inhaled deeply, dazed by Freddie’s warm scent.

Freddie was the only man he had ever met who returned from the club in the early hours still smelling fresh of his cologne.

Freddie smiled contentedly, nuzzling closer into Jim’s arms, and Jim felt the first stirrings of passion.

He would have his man tonight, but it wouldn’t be hurried, hard and enflamed, it would be soft and tender.

He would wrap him warm in the afterglow and intertwine their legs until morning.

“This is pretty” Jim whispered, pulling on a long frill attached to Freddie’s white tee.

“It’s Mary’s” Freddie whispered with a giggle, as Jim twirled the cotton around his hand, when he noticed an angry bruise seeping out from around the silver bangles at his wrist.

Jim raised Freddie’s arm to his lips. “What’s this?” he inquired.

The unwelcome pictures played through his mind like a 1920’s black and white movie.

_Freddie in the club, passion fuelled eyes reflecting the lights, the beat rebounding in his chest._

_Freddie being held firmly by a man…maybe two… who kissed him violently and breathlessly, evoking more passion than Jim ever could._

_His arm twisted behind his back – above his head…_

Freddie turned to him, a mischievous twinkle in his eye as he took an enormous breath.

“A giant grabbed me and tried to drag me off to his lair,” Freddie gushed with an Oscar winning outraged expression. “He was dressed head to toe in leather and chains. If it hadn’t been for Phoebe and Roger he’d have had his wicked way with me!” Freddie stopped for breath, eyes enormous and round as he waited for his target audience to react with shock and fury.

“Gah!” gasped Roger laughing, rolling onto his back. “Get fucked off! Don’t listen Jim, he’s full of shit!”

Freddie shook his head with exaggerated outrage.

“He is!” Roger confirmed.

“I’ll tell the tale” said Peter joining in with the raucous laughter. “How many times did the doorman ask you to get down off the table Freddie?”

“Twice” Freddie muttered softly, examining his nails.

“Twenty-five times!” screeched Roger.

Phoebe held up his hand. “With God as my witness that doorman asked you to get down fifteen times Freddie!”

Freddie giggled burying his face in Jim’s jumper.

“He was a mardy bugger” conceded Freddie. “I was only dancing.”

“On a wobbly table” yelled Roger, “…it was inches from collapse, you fat git!”

Jim swung Freddie round to face him, holding the bruised limb up to his lips.

“Were you dancing on an unsafe table sweetheart? Come on, answer me honestly” Jim chuckled. “Come on, lie to my face, then I’ll know what it looks like.”

Freddie tried, but humour overtook him, and he couldn’t hold it back. “The doorman was a bully” he pouted.

“I’ll grant you that” said Jim, holding Freddie’s arm up to the light examining the damage.

“Fifteen times Jim!” stated Peter with a chuckle.

“Excessive force Peter,” Jim retorted with good humour.

“Stop making me laugh, I need to piss” Roger clutched his stomach, tears of laughter rolling down his face.

“Me first” Freddie shrieked, racing Roger to the bathroom.

Suddenly Jim did fancy that brandy, as he filled up his and Peter’s glasses.

He sat back and looked around him, how different his home appeared when filled with noise, warmth, and light.

In short – when it was filled with Freddie.

***********************

Freddie rushed into the lounge dripping water onto the floor. A fluffy white towel was draped around his waist and a toothbrush rammed in his mouth. He slowed when he realised Peter was still in the room.

“Roggie’s stopping” he whispered to Jim around the brush, with an excited sparkle in his eyes. “Have we got a new toothbrush anywhere?”

As he spoke the towel unexpectedly fell in a heap around his feet.

“Woah!” Peter shouted, clamping a hand over his eyes, and stumbling to his feet. “That’s my cue to leave you lads in peace.”

Jim jumped to his feet in an attempt to rescue Freddie’s modesty.

The man himself could only laugh.

Jim wrapped the towel around him, holding his body close. “You’re in my bed though” Jim demanded, planting kisses over Freddie’s nose. “You are not sharing with Roger.”

A light blush suffused prettily across Freddie’s cheekbones, and his eyes seemed to sparkle even more.

“Am I?” he teased, playfully avoiding Jim’s kisses, while leaving little splodges of toothpaste with his own.

Jim spun Freddie around, slapping his bottom as he followed him into the bathroom.

“We can pull out the camp bed for you Peter if you want to stay?” Jim shouted down the hall as he emerged with an unopened toothbrush for Roger.

“Thanks, but no thanks. I could do with a walk. Oh, by the way, I’ve changed your bulbs. This one was on its way out too,” said Peter, pointing at the light in the living room.

“Thanks pal, what would I do without you” said Jim warmly as he walked Peter to the door, as another thought was crossing his mind. “… and feel free to act as Freddie’s bodyguard when you’re out and about if I’m not with him.” Jim flushed uncomfortably. The idea of the hired help hiring some help not quite making sense to him in the moment, but his concern weighing too heavily. “I was joking earlier, but that bruise does look nasty. I don’t know what Freddie has told you, but I was a doorman when I met him, and that is excessive force.”

Peter’s own discomfort turned to humour. “Trust Freddie to bring home the doorman.”

The men laughed as Jim shut the door, but he wondered what else Peter knew about Freddie and doormen that he wasn’t saying.

***********************

Roger’s melodic snoring that was drifting through the ceiling almost added to the cosiness of the home - and it was a home - whenever Freddie was in it.

Jim laughed as he approached his man, who was lying on the bed hair still wet from the shower, legs akimbo, and snoring loudly.

He knew Freddie wasn’t really sleeping - drowsy maybe from the glut of alcohol and the warmth of the shower - but Jim knew he didn’t sleep in that posture, any more than he snored that loudly.

Jim pulled some fleece pyjamas out of the drawer where they had been stuffed earlier in the week.

The nights lately had been extra cold - even before the snow had started to fall.

He crawled up the bed, armed with the pyjama bottoms trying to poke Freddie’s feet through the holes.

“Mr. Hutton, are you dressing me?” Freddie asked sharply. “Should I worry that you are covering my beautiful body?” he asked with a giggle, as Jim struggled to pull the pyjamas up his legs and over his bottom.

“It’s cold sweetheart. I want you to be snuggly and warm” Jim confessed.

He could almost hear Freddie rolling his eyes.

Freddie attempted to kick his feet. “They’re huge!” he wailed, giggling. “Clown pants.”

Jim laughed, pulling at the excess fabric around the waist.

“They are actually. This is the smallest pair I could find in the men’s department, and I draw the line at shopping in the boy’s section for my husband.”

Freddie sighed happily as Jim placed tender kisses along his ribcage, over his chest and up his throat.

Stopping abruptly, Jim laughed out loud. “Freddie, you’re foaming at the mouth!” he exclaimed. “Did you rinse at all after you brushed your teeth?”

Freddie giggled sleepily.

“See, I wash you much more effectively than you do yourself when you’re this drunk” Jim laughed softly, gathering Freddie into his arms as he covered them both in layers of blankets.

Jim pushed his hands into the front of the pyjamas cupping Freddie’s body suggestively, but nothing was stirring.

“Freddie?” Jim whispered.

Freddie’s breathing was coming in a soft rhythm, and his body felt limp in Jim’s arms.

Jim chuckled as he leaned over Freddie to turn out the lamp. “Night night darling” he whispered placing a kiss to Freddie’s freshly shaven cheek.

Jim’s head fell onto the soft pillow as the room was plunged into darkness.

“Dammit” he whispered. He had forgotten to turn on Freddie’s fairy lights.

Jim momentarily laid back onto the pillow, trying to relax, but rest wouldn’t come. It had been weeks since Freddie had the last nightmare, but he didn’t want this night to set off a fresh round.

He climbed back out of bed silently, trying not to gasp when his feet met with the cold linoleum.

“Ebony….” a soft croak came from the bed.

“Christ! You are drunk sweetheart” Jim said with a quiet chuckle. “Ebony is beside you, on your pillow. Oh, and I fed her that treat you promised her earlier, she was…..”

“No!” Freddie interrupted Jim’s patter. “I promised Ebony that I would come home to you every night…I won’t cheat on you Jim. I love you.”

With that Jim climbed back into the warm bed. Gathering an already sleeping Freddie in his arms and rocking him tightly.

Everything would be ok - because Freddie loved him.


End file.
